Starting last month, and the New Year, Open Road sent a promotion list of 13 of Taylor Caldwell's novels. They didn't even include the five novels on which I spent most of my newsletters: Those I called the Mediterranean Novels. 

Further, while it appears that evil was constantly a part of TC's mind, this list excludes several that are on that topic; yet, are among her best. For example, Time No longer and Testimony of Two Men, nor – as one wewsletter reader reminded me, Tender Victory. I grouped that list under three titles. 

Deep State, Industrial America: Diatribes on Evil:  TC Personally (sort-of). That last list because Birchers loved her autobiography, On Growing up Tough. I place this month's OR selections – each at the promotional price of $2.99 –  here.  There are 11 of them, so between the two – at the beginning of last month and this – OR has done 24 promotions from the 36 TC volumes that the family has entrusted to them. 

All are $2.99. You can purchase the promotion by clicking the colored link. 

The first two groupings go under the same two headings as previously. That last group, though, can't be classified under one heading. Two I have already treated, and last two I haven't even read.

 

Two have strong female heroines that did allow her to compare such with contemporary American women (in the '60s and '70s). Those she didn't appear to like. I should say, though, she was jealous – viscerally, preteranaturally toxically – of many women, especially young women. 

Here I would like to introduce a topic, with which I have flirted, with good reason. 

While it is easy to say they are both like snowflakes – no two are alike – that doesn't actually hold up in contemporary America. I have yet to see it said elsewhere that neither has been so well-defined that it explains why they recognize each other almost upon contact. Indeed,  articles seem to take their definition for granted. 

Further, rather than treat this as inappropriate, I can only note that when either persuasion gets together, they seem to think appropriately in their groups. Alas, you are one or the other. That doesn't make sense to me. Even the NY Times has opinion editors that I can't easily classify – like Frank Bruni and Ross Douthat – who claim being non-Trump conservatives.  

I've brought up in several newsletters that TC doesn't fit today's conservative to a tee. Ah, but a conservative is clearly what she was. That is because there is what she paid obeisance to in public, though in her actual life as documented by what I saw of her, and what Peggy and Judy said of her, she was not. Then, what she was to the core. 

Lord knows she was definitely not what today is called pro-life. Nor, though even more strongly she declared herself in the direction of Jesus, did she uphold anything from the beatitudes. In her life personally, she was no believer in "entering by the narrow gate." 

In her actual descriptions of physical presence, she imbued her heroines, and I can name many (starting with Therese in Time no Longer, and Aspasia in Glory and the Lightning) with ample grace. Yet, she exhibited little such in person. Neither in voice, nor demeanor, nor statement did TC exhibit generosity, empathy, nor compassion. 

Yet, she was throughout her novels a conservative in the Hobbesian tradition: Life is tough, get over it. Further, she abhorred any word that smacked of an open and potentially changing view of the world. Life she contended could not be ameliorated. She literally hated the word progress. 

If you wonder how I know, beyond seeing her in person, it is right there in her novels. Especially among the passages she clearly thought were some of her cleverest.  

Further, there is reason to believe, that she had considerable influence on what the world grew to understand about conservative viewpoints. Then, that was not a new topic. After all, she inherited much of her viewpoint from having grown up in her Scotch family, with parents who exhibited what poor family Scottish conservatism was all about. 

She hated her brother Arthur, possibly an extreme siblings rivalry, but I wouldn't know for sure. I cannot recall ever having met him. Peggy in her autobiography barely mentions him. 

Yet, our grandfather was not only from the south, but he had a military background, and no serious education. I've met his (other) children. As I've said previously of my aunts and an uncle, though slightly younger than myself, they wouldn't offend even a die-hard conservative today. (Though one is gay.) 

No! It is Marcus Reback, and TC's own intelligence that adds complication to her conservativeness. Further, again and again in her novels, and back pages, she blasts her diatribes against progress, or serious kind of change. I started on that topic when I raised the case of the very bright and commendable Allan Bakke, whose admission to medical school at an age – really not so ancient – became a trial for affirmative action.

My case was that it was a trial for dealing with changes in American society that marked progress for some, and hopeless liberalism to others. 

Both TC's Mediterranean novels, and her Diatribes against Evil novels evince her klaxon spleen (you can't hear it, but I can) on the topic. That is the topic on which I think TC would wish to speak out today – pleading with you to listen – if she were still with us. I will do a version of that, without the pleading, in a future newsletter. 

Michael Fried, Grandson For the Descendants of Taylor Caldwell
Temperatures here in Colorado will rise this week, sometimes hitting the 60s, though we can expect additional snow. Maybe it is time to move my image toward St. Patricks or even Easter.
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